I'm a kind of paranoiac in reverse. I suspect people of plotting to make me happy.

• Getting the Squeeze out of Life
• Holy Crap. What hasn't happened over the past few months since I last posted something on this blog? The problem with posting infrequently is that the enormity of the body of stories you need to catch up on writing grows, making the task more overwhelming with time. So, if you'll beg my pardon, I'm going to try and just list the important points...

• Penguin Proposed. I should have seen it coming but I really, truly didn't. He proposed at home, one on one, and gave me a beautiful button ring that he designed himself. I didn't even hesitate to say yes... in fact, I said yes so quickly that Penguin didn't get to make the speech he planned before I sat down on the couch quietly hyperventilating with joy. The ring is a button because buttons hold things together. But buttons can't work alone: they need a hole that's just the right size, just like Penguin is just the right fit for me! The 4 holes at the center represent the 2 of us and our 2 families, with the thread that ties us all together. The thread makes an X and the button makes an O, for XO, or LOVE!






• As an added bonus, Penguin has also acquired a job out here in Winnipeg - so, for the first time in the 5 years that we've been dating, we finally live in the same city (not to mention the same apartment). Cohabitation has been pure Eden. Everyone warned us that there would be bumps along the way as we transitioned from living independently to living with each other but frankly, we haven't really noticed them because we're both just so grateful to have each other around all the time. It really is incredible.
• Lastly, I'm almost done my first year of residency!!! And (a) I'm not dead, and (b) I haven't killed anyone (yet). I didn't realize how much I'd learned or how far I'd come until we had a patient come in at 4 am one night while I was on the acute care service. I was alone in the hospital - my senior and attending had both gone home to sleep - and this patient arrived somnolent, septic, and unstable. I didn't hesitate: 2 large bore IVs, 2L of normal saline under pressure, stat blood work, upright chest xray, EKG, antibiotics... and without having to ask for help (although I called my senior to give them a head's up on the situation), I flooded that patient with 6L of fluid and had them stabilized and ready for the OR in a matter of 2 hours. It turned out that they had a gastric ulcer that had perforated, creating a hole in the stomach the size of my fist. Had the same patient come in during the first few months of my residency, I would have been filled with uncertainty and certainly needed my senior there to guide me through their care. It was a big turning point for me when I realized that I knew how to deal with an unstable patient all on my own.

• Recipe I've Been Drooling Over
• Penguin recently made these "Boyfriend Approved Vegan Burgers" and I've got to say that they're pretty delightful. We ate them with hummus instead of catsup and it was awesome.

• Favourite Thing on Etsy this Week
• Best. Cat. Toy. Ever. (It's even organic, too!)

• What I'm Reading Right Now
• I've read 2 books in the past few months... When God was a Rabbit by Sarah Winman, which in my opinion is on par with Come Thou Tortoise by Jessica Grant (aka the best book ever!). The other is Let's Pretend This Never Happened by Jenny Lawson, which is hilarious and frivolous (the best kind of study break, in my opinion).

• TED Talk I Watched This Week
• As suggested by a good friend, here's a TED Talk on vulnerability. Enjoy!

• Song of the Week
• This week, Penguin is away at a conference. While living together is pretty damn blissful, there is still something to be said for those times when one finds themselves alone in the house. It's an opportunity to shower with the bathroom door open, to wear only your underwear while making dinner, to eat only crackers for dinner without someone heckling your lousy nutrition... I used to think that by doing these things every day when I lived alone, I'd never be remediated into normal company again but it turns out that it's not hard to be civilized when the man you love is around. So, now that my alone time is scarce (which is exactly how I like it), I do my best to enjoy it. This video strongly attests to some of the antics I get up to when Penguin is away.

• Thing I'm Most Grateful for This Week
• Having Penguin here in Winnipeg with me. He sacrificed a lot to come out here, start a new job, and still barely gets to see me as I race back and forth between long hours at work and too few hours spent sleeping. I sometimes wonder how I'm ever going to really show him just how much it means to me.

• Thing I'm Most Looking Forward to This Week
• Hitting the gym more often. I've been slacking for the last little while and I'm looking forward to re-establishing some balance.

• Bunny Photo of the Week
• No available bunny photo this week. Although I can report that Hoyle has settled in well with his new buddy, Penguin's kitten Zoe. Hoyle immediately established the leadership role and Zoe has been running scared ever since. Hoyle also outweighs Zoe by a few pounds, so I don't blame her for being nervous around him. Haha.

Weekly Update: Less than a Week Until Christmas!!

• Getting the Squeeze out of Life
• In follow up to my previous post, and in response to the emails of some concerned family and friends, there is no doubt in my mind that I've picked the right profession. There is also no greater reward than taking into hospital someone fiercely injured and sending them home a week or two later largely in-tact again. So despite all the anguish and horror, trauma has been my favourite rotation so far. The only thing that really gets to me is when people survive catastrophic injuries with significant morbidity. At this point, it's hard to see beyond their loss of function and emotional scars. It's hard not to think - as unpolitically correct as it may seem - they would have been better off dead. I think, though, that this is largely because we don't often get to see the long-term recovery of these patients. When we sign off as a surgical service, the patients are still in the first phases of their recovery and therefore still appear as mangled, dysfunctional bodies that entrap the bright and aware minds and souls of their hosts. However, I did manage to find the perfect TED talk that addresses this particular conundrum. I'll include it with some details down below.
• For me, dealing with some of the rather unsavory personality types that come in via the trauma service was not as difficult as I thought it might be. I met a whole slew of people who did awful, horrible things to others: from serial rapists, to murderers, to gang bangers, to cop killers. You name it, I laid hands on them, sutured them, talked to them every day about their physical pain, and stayed up late at night trying to solve their problems and get them well again. And for me, it wasn't a crisis of conscience. In dealing with these people, I was reminded of a quote from Joan Halifax, "Compassion has enemies: pity, moral outrage, and fear". Anytime it became difficult to treat one of these patients, my reaction was easily identified as one of those 3 responses, and then, once identified, set aside so that the work could be done.
• It's one thing to limit your practice to "the easy patients" - I mean, if you were given the choice, who would you rather round on every day: a sweet-mannered soccer mom who was in a car accident and broke her leg, does everything you recommend for healing, and sends you and the staff a gift basket when discharged - or-  the impoverished, homeless woman with lice and paranoid schizophrenia who happens to have appendicitis and throws her food tray at your head when you try to assess her belly? The fact is, both of them need help. I, for one, would never want to limit my practice to exclude the latter case simply because it makes my day easier. Medicine, for me, is about treating the breadth of humanity - and trauma has a way of being rather non-selective in its demographics. You are just as likely to get the homeless lady who was hit by a car as you the soccer mom who was driving it.

• Recipe I've Been Drooling Over
• So, on average I manage to score about 4-5 hrs of sleep a night... which means eating breakfast before leaving the house is a tough feat. Fortunately, a leftover can of pumpkin puree in my fridge inspired me to look up this recipe: cheddar, black pepper, and pumpkin muffins are the perfect solution to a fast morning routine plus they have a 5/5 'stick to your ribs' quality that is only beat by steel-cut oats. I highly recommend you try them!

• Favourite Thing on Etsy this Week
• Christmas is coming! Christmas is coming! And, while I'll be working, it doesn't mean that I've been above cruising the internerd for some great gift ideas. Here are my favourites from Etsy this year:

• If any man were to wear  a bowtie of this caliber, he would be guaranteed to make me swoon. What a delight!

• It's a snowflake and snuggling rabbits! Best Christmas Ornament Ever!

• If you can blink your way past the price tag, this piece of art is both profound and inspiring. Not only does it make use of my favourite medium, linocut, but also perfectly captures the best of my favourite season. With that in mind, I think the artist has priced their piece well: good work deserves good value.

• Last but not least, I can't help but smile when I look at this picture. It comes with a sequel that describes "animals of low moral standing"... but I feel that it is important to point out at the trifecta of animal awesomeness are all included in the high moral standing group: penguin, frog, and rabbit. :)

• What I'm Reading Right Now
• Textbooks upon textbooks upon textbooks....  'nuff said. :(

• TED Talk I Watched This Week
• What better than a first hand account of what it's like to survive one of the traumas that so disturb me. This woman was hit by a car, remained in a coma for 18 months, and was discharged to a senior's home because there was no long term care or rehab facility appropriate for her needs. When she says, "they had given up on me, called me a gomer... and the hospital really didn't know what to do with someone in my state", she couldn't be more correct. We deal very poorly with people who do not quickly return to their baseline, require very long term rehab, and have morbidities that make us uncomfortable about our job performance.

• Song of the Week
• special thanks to scarlett for another terrific referral! I promise to post something more festive next week. :)

The Shrine / An Argument from Sean Pecknold on Vimeo.

• Thing I'm Most Grateful for This Week
• Family and friends. And sleep.... dear lord, do I love sleep. It makes everything so much better.

• Thing I'm Most Looking Forward to This Week
• Christmas!!!! Since I can't be there in person, Penguin is going to skype me in for his family's Chrismas morning so I can still share in the family fun. xo

• Bunny Photo of the Week
• It is with a heavy heart that Hoyle, Penguin, and I wish Jazz bunny a fond farewell. A few weeks ago she became acutely ill and passed away quite suddenly at the vet's. It was a very difficult time for all of us and we miss her very much.
• Hoyle felt things most acutely for she was his 24/7 friend and, well they are rabbits, lover. Every day, he'd search the house looking for her and when he couldn't find her, he'd start the search all over again. It was heartbreaking to watch. He lost his appetite, lost interest in doing anything but looking for his friend, and was clearly depressed.
• It took about a week and a half before I realized that my human love couldn't heal his broken bunny heart, so off we set to find him a new bunny. No rabbits were available at the local shelter, so we drove for an hour out of town to meet a breeder of rex rabbits. Hoyle met several bunnies that day and chose, to my surprise, a wee boy bunny whom we have now named Murphy (surprised? I thought not. haha).
• Murphy is settling in nicely and while they aren't cohabitating yet, they are doing very well together.
• Hoyle and I still miss Jazz very much but Hoyle is doing much better since Murphy has come home. And Murphy seems to understand that Hoyle is in need of some tender bunny loving and goes out of his way to groom and snuggle Hoyle as much as he can.

With great love for her indomitable spirit and
sweet peaceful soul- we miss you terribly,  Jazz: 2008-2011.

Welcome to the Family, Murphy!

It's not by looking into the light that we become luminous but by plunging into the darkness. - Carl G. Jung

Forgive me if I haven't posted in quite some time... I've been working on the trauma service and the endless parade of human suffering, despair, and hopelessness have been keeping me up at night, even when I'm not on call.

Some nights, if feels like an endless stream of stabbing in the _____ (chest, abdomen, limb, back, etc), ditto for gunshot wounds (self-inflicted, gang-related, shot by police/lover/family member, you name it). All in combination with a variety of alcohol / substance abuse, my favourites so far being: "spray and 7" (hairspray mixed with 7-up) as well as "lemon paint" (paint thinner plus lemonade). Highest recorded alcohol in a conscious, talking, oriented person so far: 84.0 (legal limit: 0.08; toxic level 38.0).

There are so many more stories. Slowly, the trauma service eats away at your sense of humanity. I stare at the ceiling at night wondering why I don't feel more. It should be devastating. These cases should reduce me to tears. But there are just so many and the stories are often just so extreme. It starts to numb you... until you drive home and someone tries to cut you off and you find yourself parked on the sidewalk, shaking in the drivers seat, imaging yourself on the trauma room stretcher staring up at the faces of your team members as they mumble to themselves, "there are injuries worse than death."

The two most revolutionary things a man can say is, "I'm Staying."

It's not often that I get riled up about political things... but with the recent topsy-turvy results in Canadian federal politics and the tragic death of Jack Layton, I've been keeping an eye on the media and what they've been saying about Parliament Hill.

One of my favourite sources for the down-low on Canadian politics is actually Rick Mercer... because really, I could watch the House of Commons on Channel 200-and-something but frankly those whining, unprofessional louses make me want to crash down the door and demand better representation - while at least Rick makes me laugh by poking fun at them and keeping me in the loop at the same time.

So, it came as a surprise when Rick Mercer recently posted "Urge to Merge" advocating for a merger between the Liberals and the NDP. So much so, that I was inspired to send in a response, which I thought I'd also post here:

Rick Mercer,

I've been a long-time fan of yours but was really quite surprised to see your latest rant proposing that the Liberals and NDP merge parties to provide better competition to the Conservatives. I feel quite strongly that this is not the solution to the flaws in our current political situation- and no, I'm not one of the soap-box-standing-lawn-sign-picketing political idealists you referred to in the rant, I'm an average joe citizen (at the age of twenty-something) who has a vested interest in politics because I choose to exercise my right to vote.

During the last several federal elections, I wanted to know how to spend my vote wisely, so I started doing some research into how our voting system runs and what other kinds of democratic systems exist. A great video is available on youtube that describes the problem with first past the post (fptp) voting and shows exactly why the two-party system you're advocating for isn't the right solution. A good solution would be to change the way we vote! I don't want my choices limited to conservative or not conservative - that's what got us into this pickle jar in the first place. I realize that an electoral referendum was held in Ontario in 2007 and failed to make waves... but perhaps that was because the general public wasn't sufficiently educated on what exactly fptp voting is and why the current system sucks.

Now I know that your primary objective is to provide comedic commentary on the Canadian political scene but I think your greatest attraction is the accessible and evocative insight into politics that you offer the average Canadian citizen. For this reason, I found it surprising - and admittedly disappointing - that you advocated for the status quo in "Urge to Merge". Please consider using your considerable influence to show Canadians that they don't have to be stuck with a two-party system, forcing them to be divided into groups of "for" or "against" the current party-in-power. Our goal as a Canadian and democratic society should not be to protect a minority rule (the breeding ground for the political apathy you covered so well during the election) when we have the option to empower all Canadians to participate in politics through offering a diversity of parties that can identify and advocate for individuals' unique values and interests.

Thank you and keep up the good work. 

Cheers,

Saroja 

So what do you think about all this?